Leave us alone

Dallas Morning News: When the Federal Trade Commission on Friday announced the launching of its "do not call" registry, designed to thwart unwanted telemarketing, the stampede of consumers to the program's Web site crashed the server. Is anyone surprised? Countless Americans have had their dinners or even their sleep interrupted, night after night, by unsolicited sales calls. They want out!
Peaceful evenings will soon return to those who place their telephone numbers into the FTC registry. It's quick, simple and free. You can do it in minutes by going to the www.donotcall.gov Web site, or by calling toll-free (888)-382-1222 (TTY 1-866-290-4236) from the number you wish to register. Those registering by the end of August can expect telemarketers to remove them from call lists by Oct. 1. If they ring after that, telemarketers can be fined up to $11,000 per call.
Loopholes
There are loopholes allowing political organizations, pollsters, charities and others to call, but this welcome new program will provide relief for millions of fed-up consumers who just want to be left alone.
Congress must now devise a similar program to block unwanted e-mails called "spam." Here's a suggestion: Require online marketers to begin the subject lines of their sales pitches with the word "ADV," for advertisement. Anti-spam programs could be set to filter those mails out. Spam might seem like a relatively petty scourge, but helping ordinary people fight it and other obnoxious forms of marketing are little things that count for a lot with consumers who are, after all, are also voters.